


Stuck With The Song Inside Your Head (Looping Like A Broken Record)

by Waffle-o (XylB)



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Angst, Death penalty, Drugs, FAHC, GTA Universe, Implied/Referenced Suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2017-08-11
Packaged: 2018-09-01 04:47:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8608570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XylB/pseuds/Waffle-o
Summary: This is how Ray's death breaks the crew and this is how they try to glue it back together. (But the pieces are too jagged and the will's too weak.)





	1. Chapter 1

Gavin Free, you understand, is beautiful. He's absolutely, drop-dead, hellfire and snow, breathtakingly gorgeous.

The only problem is, if you could even call it a problem, he loves too darn much. And there's a piece that goes missing, red fading into black, when Ray dies.

Ray's death sent splinters spiralling into the crew, cracks that turned into shatters and here they are, broken and wounded and trying desperately to sew themselves back together, only they're missing the needle.

 

Anyway.

This is how it starts.

Ray Narvaez Jr.: gunned down by a cop whilst fleeing the crime scene

Michael Jones: halfway to the cop when the bullet lands

Gavin Free: ten storeys down, oblivious to the chaos above him and captivated by the chaos around him

Geoff Ramsey: yelling over the comms

Jack Pattillo: flying

Ryan Haywood: running

 

Freeze-frame. Record scratch. How the fuck did we end up here?

 

Well, -

 

Boom! Explosion shakes the building and breaks the ice.

A sudden hurtling into motion.

Ray falls, already mostly dead because there's a LSPD bullet just below his heart and there's no way Michael can save him. Michael knows this. Michael doesn't care.

Michael shouts and shoots the cop straight in the neck, blood spray wide and arcing as he topples to the side. Michael runs past him to Ray, but skids to stop and kneels just as Ray's chest lifts for the last time.

A pause, a moment,

Then screaming and unshed tears but Ray won't wake up, he won't _wake up, damnit, Ray, wake up!_ and there's two boys on the roof, one dead and one alive, but not for much longer if he doesn't get a move on.

Michael closes Ray's eyes and moves on.

Geoff yells instructions over the comms and they all scramble to follow them, Michael grabbing Ray's gun before standing on the edge of the roof, parachute heavy on his back.

Gavin screeches around a corner and laughs as he leads the cops in a useless circle, taking a left and then a right and then he's in place for Michael.

Michael jumps and pulls the chute and Gavin does another lap around the building.

As Michael falls a dozen other things happen.

Jack veers off course to avoid the skyscraper suddenly looming in front of him only to nearly brush a police chopper – Geoff shoots the pilot out and it goes down in flames but there's two more behind them.

Ryan runs through hidden alleys and dark streets littered with broken bottles and filthy hobos. He's sweating under the mask, rivulets of red and black and white leaking down his neck as he partially regrets wearing the face paint today.

Ray's supposed to pick Ryan up, but Ryan doesn't know that won't happen. He comms Jack.

What does end up happening, the moment Michael lands and slides into Gavin's car, is Jack hooking a dingy SUV off the street.

From inside the dingy SUV, Ryan readies his rocket launcher, aiming it out the swinging car to shoot down the LSPD choppers. One goes down with a bang and the other with a whimper as Geoff shoots out the pilot before Ryan has a chance to shoot the vehicle.

No matter. More will come.

And indeed more do come, tailing them over the ocean and over the country as they fly out to the pier and then swerve round to Vinewood.

Michael's strangely quiet as he tosses grenades out the window, blowing up the old wooden bridge behind them. Four cops cars fall into the river and Gavin giggles at the following explosion, turning sharply around a large boulder and zooming past the city borders.

Gavin Free, you understand, looks absolutely stunning when he's in his element. Sunglasses halfway down his nose and green eyes bright with the thrill of crime and the adrenaline of the chase and these are the moments that made Michael fall in love with him.

Sirens fall away as they twist into the mountains, racing through dark roads and gravelly paths, Michael clenching his teeth as the car rattles around him.

They emerge safely on the other side and they wait in the abandoned lumberyard for their instructions.

Far away they see Jack's helicopter careening wildly through the air, headlights spinning as smoke pours between the blades. After what must a terrifying drop and five minutes later, Geoff's voice crackles over the comms, an _All clear_ that rings hollow when Michael replies _We lost Ray_.

A certain sort of despondent silence falls over the crew, then, a moment of mourning or maybe a moment of shock, but then Geoff orders _Regroup at the base by morning_ and they're all left to their own devices.

Timeskip, maybe a time lapse of the sun rising over Mount Chiliad, but no one's really paying attention to the sunrise when they pull into the base garage at six in the morning.

Geoff demands answers and Ryan demands details and Jack stands by with crossed arms and Gavin repeats, he _repeats for godsakes, Geoffrey, I already told you_ that he doesn't know what happened and Michael is silent, sullen.

Geoff turns on him. _Well, what the fuck happened, Michael?_

Michael shrugs, stares at the floor _Saw a cop going up the ladder. I went after him. Wasn't quick enough._

Ryan starts to say something but Jack cuts him off, a strained calm to his voice and his manner and everyone listens.

That's the beginning and then there's the aftermath, but the immediate aftermath isn't that important – there's crying and there's shouting and there's guilt and there's denial and there's a messy evening that ends in two black eyes and two broken fingers. It's the aftermath aftermath that's the story.

Ryan still blames Michael and Michael's fucking done with the attitude because _can't you see, Ryan, can't you fucking see?_ he already blames himself more than Ryan could ever blame him. It's a neverending guilt trip he tries to drown in alcohol and bar fights but somehow, some way, there's always someone to stop him – Jack with a well-timed intervention, Gavin dragging him out of the bar, Geoff locking away the whiskey, Ryan's cold stare that Michael swears he won't give in to. (He will someday, though, someday but not today, _not today_ ) (at least that's what he tells himself).

Geoff and Jack argue over the heists, over the plans, over the cars – Gavin can hear them through the walls as he curls up with a passed-out Michael, liquor still on his breath.

A month passes but nothing's better.

Ryan glares at Michael less, seems to accept that it's not really Michael's fault, it never really was, but he's still hurt and he's still angry he's hurt because, come on, he's the _Vagabond_ and no one should be close to the _Vagabond_ he should have learnt his lesson from the old crew back in Texas but _no_ he _had_ to go and fall in love with some stupid kid that only got himself killed in the end.

 _Good while it lasted_ but he can't even think that because he doesn't know if Ray ever knew how willingly Ryan would die for him, and the idea's almost ironic now.

He's angry at himself and he's angry at Ray and he's angry at Michael and at goddamn everything because it's not fucking fair.

Geoff fucks himself up in a car accident – nothing serious, a broken leg and a bruised collarbone really the only injuries that lasted – but he's stopped talking to them, all of them except Gavin, who brings him food in his bed and helps him get out of the bed when he needs to.

Humiliating, but necessary.

Jack moved out the week previous.

Michael also goes quiet – not aloof, just quiet – playing video games with a second controller by his side and cooking (when it's his turn) with no music – no shitty Spanish duets, no Katy Perry, because music was always Ray's contribution to dinner.

Gavin seems fine. Sure, he's lining up coke with a credit card more often than not these nights, and there's a few more needles littering his bathroom floor, but he's fine. He's managing. He hasn't eaten more than snacks in two days and his vision's going a little fuzzy, but his clumsiness is making Michael smile and Michael doesn't even suspect there's a reason behind it.

So everything's fine.

Timeskip, freeze-frame, record scratch.

(Two months, one week, two days, and twenty-one hours since Ray died. (I suppose this is the point where the author's supposed to say “Not that anyone's counting” but that's far from the truth. They're all counting, maybe none so meticulously as Ryan, but counting nonetheless. Ryan has it to the hour; Michael, to the minute; Jack to the day; Geoff to the day; Gavin – well, the days start blurring into weeks and weeks into minutes – wait, months - wait, how many days? Doesn't matter – he has it to the week, used to be to the day but then he started sticking needles into himself five times a night and, well, it all blurs, yeah? Timing isn't as important as the memories, he tells himself, but those are starting to blur, too.)

Two months, one week, two days, and twenty-one hours since Ryan slept on the bed he used to shared with a certain dead someone. There's a nearly permanent crick in his neck from sleeping on the sofa.)

This time:

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead

Michael Jones: third part of a Mexican standoff

Gavin Free: a minute away from fainting

Geoff Ramsey: next street over, waiting in a limousine

Jack Pattillo: unsurprised

Ryan Haywood: second part of a Mexican standoff

It _would_ have been an easy drug deal, but they're dealing with a...difficult customer, so they need the whole crew for backup, and it would have been two on one but then Ryan, the _fuck_ , turned his gun on Michael and now here they are.

Here they are, indeed.

“Ryan, what the fuck?!” Michael shouts, part exasperated and part confused. Mostly exasperated, though.

Ryan shrugs. “I figure now's a good time to step out.”

“Step out?! Step out of what?”

“This.” Ryan gestures between them with the gun. “And I figure with a witness - “ he gestures to the guy still aiming a pistol at him “ - you can't do anything about it. None of you.” He meets Jack's and Gavin's eyes, warning them.

Jack doesn't even blink at the statement. Disappointed, yes. Surprised, no.

Gavin blinks, but that's because he's trying to bring his vision back into focus.

Michael's forehead knits and he looks...hurt?

Ryan backs away easily, breaking into a run the moment he's out of good aiming range of Michael's pistol.

(Ryan's got his car stashed two streets over, all his shit stuffed into the boot, ready to go. Maybe he'll go back to Texas. Or maybe Mexico. _El Vagabundo_ does have a certain ring to it.)

Gavin faints and Jack rushes to catch him and Michael shoots the customer. Fuck the customer.

Geoff, one street over, polishes his knife and whistles along to Creedence.

Don't mistake this for the climax, the moment before the fall – they've been falling since The Incident (two months, one week, two days, twenty-two hours) and Ryan just happened to be the first piece that broke off. Like hot glass in cold water; he shattered too hard and too fast.

Timeskip – black screen.


	2. Chapter 2

Gavin Free is smart in all the right ways – socially, technologically, criminally, ethically – well, maybe that last one's not so right.

But that's not the point right now.

The point is it's five p.m. and Gavin's hands are shaking.

Ray urges him on from his peripheral – ghosts are bloody annoying, Gavin thinks, can't even see them but there they are.

So, let's check in on the crew.

Ray Narvaez Jr.: still dead, very much _not_ a ghost

Michael Jones: watching the sunset

Gavin Free: talking to Ray's ghost

Geoff Ramsey: stealing diamonds

Jack Pattillo: stealing diamonds

Ryan Haywood: not as far as he thought he'd go

Michael idly thumbs at the peeling corner of a beer bottle label, sitting on the pavement and working his way through this bottle while he waits for his car's new engine to be fitted. The clouds drag pink streaks across the Los Santos sky, faint orange striping the horizon.

It's a nice view, he thinks while he sips.

Gavin gasps as his heart goes into double time, double to match the double-dosing he's stepped up to in the last couple of weeks. To his drug-addled mind, Ray hovers just out of view, a teasing flicker in the corner of his eyes. Gavin babbles to this hallucination, he pours out his goddamn heart, but nothing ever comes of it. Ray doesn't talk to the others. Maybe that means Gavin's special.

(He's fine, though, absolutely fine. Michael hasn't discovered his dirty little secret and Gavin can keep pretending that love is enough for him. Nothing really compares to the ecstasy trip-tripping up his veins, though. He's fine.)

Geoff steadies the torch while Jack listens for the safe code, carefully attuned to the clicks as he turns the lock. They've got seven minutes to crack this and escape – Geoff glances at his watch and pats his gun – yeah, they've got this.

Ryan got halfway to Texas and turned right back around and now he's sitting on the edge of the Los Santos pier, watching the flashing lights of the ferris wheel reflected in the ocean and listening to the happy screams of children and teenagers alike. He thumbs Ray's old keychain – a faded plastic rose – and thinks.

(Four months, one week, four days, and eleven hours since Ray died.)

Geoff shoots and kicks and tosses the bag of diamonds to Jack as he plants a bomb, yelling for Jack to get out, _get out_ as they sprint to the exit.

The building explodes in a shower of wood and plaster behind them as Jack ushers them into the car and they speed out, narrowly missing the parked cars they whizz by. Police sirens wail a few minutes later but they're long gone.

Michael parks in the garage and steps out, locking the car behind him with a 'beep' as he walks past white walls, his footsteps thudding softly against the concrete. He passes the distinctly empty space where Ray's car used to be, and then Ryan's old spot, then Jack's.

They've gotten a lot smaller as a crew – in name, they're only two down, but it feels like there's only two _left_.

Michael sighs and pushes past the door to the main room, letting it swing shut behind him and close with a muted _click_. He knows Geoff and Jack are out on a mission right now, so that leaves him and Gavin at the base. It's Gavin's turn to cook dinner, but lately Michael's been taking his nights for him because Gavin seems clumsier these days.

Gavin, who, at the moment, is trying to take a shower but the soap keeps slipping from his hands and he can't quite see well enough to locate the shampoo – eyes shifting in and out of focus.

 

Timeskip, cutscenes of moments over the next two months.

Michael's face lighting up when he sees Gavin after a heist.

Geoff grinning at the prospect of a new job.

Jack loading a cargobob with supplies.

Gavin wincing as he stabs a vein too hard.

Ryan holding a gun to a woman's head.

Cutscenes end.

 

Six months since Ray died, to the day.

Freeze-frame, record scratch, what?

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead

Michael Jones: running

Gavin Free: falling

Geoff Ramsey: shouting and definitely not panicking, no sirree

Jack Pattillo: panicking

Ryan Haywood: chasing

Michael's shoes almost slip as he rounds the corner, hands scraping against the wall as he pushes against it to counter his overbalance. Zigzagging as bullets bounce off the ground behind him and Michael runs faster, lungs burning and thigh screaming as he skids around another corner, breaking into the busy street and crossing with barely a thought to the cars braking for him, horns honking loudly.

Gavin's fingers scramble for purchase, anything, but too much heroin has him clumsy and he keeps plummeting to his death. Stupid, really, stumbled off of the edge of the skyscraper as he waited for Jack and the chopper.

Speaking of.

Geoff yells and Jack shouts and they can't move the chopper in because Gavin's too close to the building and he'll just get blended if they go underneath him – they can't save him and they watch him fall to his death. Jack tries to angle the chopper but it's impossible. Geoff shouts at him to try the hook but they both know it won't work even as Jack goes to position himself above Gavin's now ragdoll body.

Meanwhile, wind tears at Michael's clothes as his feet pound relentlessly on the pavement, desperately hoping to outrun the madman behind him – a madman with a skull mask and a pink SMG, a madman named Ryan Haywood.

Ryan Haywood lost a few more pieces while he was gone and now he's a bit too jagged to fit back into the crew.

Not that this is his version of trying to fit back in. No, this is his current job – assassin – and his current paycheck – contract out on Michael Jones.

Michael turns a corner and comes face to face with Gavin's fall, skids to a stop and watches in wordless horror as Gavin's body plummets.

And suddenly there's a miraculous, spectacular moment where a hook flies towards Gavin and he grabs it, only just missing the ground as he swings below the chopper in a wide arc. Michael barely has time to process it before bullets raze the rubber of his trainers and he makes to run but he just collapses, knees on the ground and hands help up uselessly in front of him.

Above them is the chopper, both Geoff and Jack silent as they take in the scene below them.

Ryan Haywood steps closer to Michael Jones, angles a gun at the back of his head.

“Any last words?”

Michael's shoulders fall.

“Please don't do this, Ryan.”

“Still wasting words, I see.” And he pulls the trigger except -

Gavin Free, you understand, is beautiful. He's a beautiful, broken mess, and Michael Jones loves him more than anything in the world and that should have been enough, it _should have been_ but it wasn't.

And maybe that step off wasn't as accidental as it seemed.

\- Michael ducks at the right moment and Ryan shoots the ground, growling angrily but Michael twists and grab his wrist, jerking it down hard enough to hear the crunch of bone as it fractures. Ryan punches, Michael avoids, jumps to his feet, seemingly fueled by a newfound anger, and he nails Ryan in the shins, kicks a sharp heel at his knee and grins at the snap he hears as Ryan crumples. Ryan gets a punch into Michael's solar plexus, winding him before grabbing at his legs, shoving them out from under him.

By that time Jack's turned the chopper around and Geoff's got the rifle out, aiming straight at Ryan's head.

Five things happen at once in that moment.

A bullet hits Jack's arm.

The chopper drops a sudden foot and a half.

Geoff shoots.

Geoff misses.

Ryan pushes a snarling Michael away and retreats into the car rolling up beside them.

The car zooms away and Michael curses himself for not thinking that Ryan would have backup. He lays back down on the pavement, his head spinning and jaw throbbing. He steadfastly ignores the whirring blades above him.

And now somehow the hunters became the hunted.


	3. Chapter 3

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead

Michael Jones: locked in his room

Gavin Free: gone

Geoff Ramsey: trying to open Michael's room

Jack Pattillo: next to Geoff

Ryan Haywood: bleeding out

Freeze-frame, rewind. Shouting and yelling and too much, _too much_ – Gavin walking out, running away (he needs space he needs _space_ ), away from Michael and away from the base.

He'll come back (Michael would like to say he knows but he only thinks). He always does (there's a first time for everything).

Michael presses his hands to his eyes and inhales shakily as the door rattles again.

Gavin sits dangerously close to the edge of a cliff, swinging his legs carelessly and wondering how quickly his neck would break if he jumped now.

It's tempting, more than tempting, but something shimmers in his peripheral, maybe a mirage or maybe a trick of the mind. It doesn't talk – Ray never does – and Gavin scoffs lightly.

There isn't enough distraction right now, not enough to shake the echo of Ray from his mind.

Gavin doesn't ever seem to get the right distractions.

Ryan groans brokenly and presses his hand to his ribs, futilely trying to staunch the blood flow. But shaking palms are useless against gunshots and all he can do is feel wet warmth pour through his fingers and gather sticky on his shirt.

There's no backup, no help, and Ryan knows he's going to die here in an abandoned Los Santos warehouse, concrete cold against his back and blood hot against his hand.

He slips away quietly.

Without knowing it, the FAHC are down another member.

Timeskip: a few weeks.

(Seven months, two weeks, one day, and five hours since Ray died.)

Ray Narvaez Jr.: very much dead

Michael Jones: having dinner

Gavin Free: dizzy

Geoff Ramsey: planning

Jack Pattillo: having dinner

Ryan Haywood: dead? 

Ryan Haywood wakes up and sees bright lights above him. He wonders briefly if this is some sort of heaven, or maybe the beginning of his hell, and he starts to call the name that first springs to mind - “Ray” - but with the sudden dimming of the lights the words fall away like ash in his mouth, thick and clogging in his desperately dry throat.

A kindly face appears above him, black eyebrows slanted together in a sympathetic expression that makes Ryan want to spit. He doesn't want pity.

“Hello? Can you hear me?” The voice sounds distant, far away, like a mother beckoning their child in from the dark. Ryan blinks once in acknowledgement and then again, deliberately, when the question is repeated.

The next thing Ryan Haywood notices is the tubes running into his veins and then sheer panic takes over and he doesn't quite remember the rest later.

Michael Jones pushes food around on his plate and sighs, glancing at Gavin, whose plate is still untouched.

“You okay, Gavin?” Jack asks around a mouthful of broccoli, and Gavin blinks slowly, propping his head up with his hand.

“Gav?” Michael asks, dropping his fork to steady Gavin when he sways a little.

“My head,” Gavin mumbles, and Michael's eyebrows draw in as he leans closer to hear better.

“Gav?”

“M'chael, 'm dizzy,” Gavin slurs, and then his chin slips from his hand and his face smashes into the table next to his plate as he passes the _fuck_ out.

Geoff doesn't hear any of this, locked away in his office to focus on heist plans and job contracts. He doesn't hear the shuffling or Michael's shouting or the dead quiet that resounds when Jack finds something in Gavin's veins.

He doesn't hear anything at all even when Michael thinks his heart breaking is the loudest sound in the room.

You see, this is all about instinct and reaction, cause and effect. Dominoes and card houses. When one falls, they all fall. Ray to Ryan to Gavin to Michael to Jack to Geoff.

Ryan wakes up with straps around his limbs now and a less sympathetic face above him.

Michael sits vigil while Gavin recovers, wondering how the hell he missed all the signs.

 

Timeskip: cutscenes, blood, screams, regret.

 

(Nine months.)

Ray Narvaez Jr.: decomposing

Michael Jones: defeated

Gavin Free: destroyed - almost

Geoff Ramsey: despairing

Jack Pattillo: despondent

Ryan Haywood: desperate

 

Nowadays Gavin's leaning more on Michael than the drugs – it's good, it's better, but he's still fucked up in more ways than one and it's uncertain if he'll ever bounce back – if any of them will.

Michael's terrified of what they've become in the wake of Ray's death.

Jack took a contract job on the mainland after a nasty argument with Geoff and no one's sure he'll return.

Geoff watches the scraps of the Fake AH slip through his fingers and tries harder but you can't hold on to dust. He's got too much heart and not enough teeth.

Ryan wants _out_ he wants _out_ whether that be through death or some miracle – he's back to his pre-Fake days, running suicide missions and purposely outnumbering himself with the guilty thrill that someone might get a shot in.

(Eleven months.)

Jack does come back. He pretends Geoff's eyes are dry when Geoff hugs him.


	4. Chapter 4

(Twelve months. A year. A whole goddamn year.)

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead for a year now

Michael Jones: trying

Gavin Free: failing

Geoff Ramsey: setting fire to Ryan's old car

Jack Pattillo: with Geoff

Ryan Haywood: playing with fire

Record scratch. Freeze frame. I think you all know how we ended up here.

 

Geoff kicks at the packed dirt with a scuffed shoe as the Zentorno blazes in front of him, flames licking at the leather and melting the paint job. Black paint drips to the ground and Geoff tries to forget the memories in that car, the victories and the failures, the highs and the lows.

Michael rubs his hands over Gavin's arms to try and stop the shakes – withdrawal isn't pretty – but Gavin's eyes are half-unfocused and Michael can feel familiar restlessness licking at his heels – no jobs, no plans, only him, Gavin, Geoff, and Jack and he hates that he knows how this ends.

Gavin can't quite feel his fingertips and everything's kind of blurry but he recognises the warmth of Michael's hands, so nice and so grounding against his itchy skin, gentle fingertips over old track marks – but he knows this can't last forever and he also knows how this ends. (Although his ending is different than Michael's – in Gavin's version he himself doesn't survive.)

Ryan gets a bullet through the thigh but he survives, much to his chagrin.Cut to black.

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead

Michael Jones: gone

Gavin Free: floating

Geoff Ramsey: rooting through medkits

Jack Pattillo: finding medkits

Ryan Haywood: no white lights

Michael doesn't say goodbye when he leaves, but he blows up the Maze Bank on his way out, littering the building with stickies and breaching charges that set a fiery backdrop in his rearview mirror.

Something wet stings his eyes and he roughly wipes his sleeve over them, blaming it on the dry desert air rushing in through the open window but he's past lying to himself (or so he says).

Gavin can't quite – focus – god, the lights are pretty when they blur together, aren't they? - Geoff, Geoff shaking his arms and – Gavin doesn't remember Geoff's tattoos ever moving before.

“Gavin, stay with me,” Geoff orders, holding him steady with one hand as he flips through a medical guide with the other.

Jack finds the right needle and the right vein and Gavin froths at the mouth as they pump him full of other drugs – not the ones he wants but the ones he needs – and Geoff holds his friend down to stop him hurting him.

The first thing Gavin asks for when he rouses, hours later, is Michael. No one wants to tell him the truth.

So no one does.

Ryan spits blood into the dust and punches a guy in the face – the satisfying _crack_ of his nose echoes in the alley and Ryan's backsliding into primal violence now, trading in guns for fists and grenades for knives. He's writing his will in broken ribs and black eyes across the desert and he wonders, almost sadly, if anyone'll notice.

A fist slams into his ribs and Ryan grins at the challenge.

Timeskip – sunrise, sunset, and maybe a flash of something in between – a wicked grin or a quiet penthouse.

 

The crew is much the same.

Sixteen months to the day.

There never was a funeral.

Looks like there never will be.

 

Ray Narvaez Jr.: still dead

Michael Jones: behind the solid steel bars of the LSPD HQ

Gavin Free: not interested – not interested in much at all, really

Geoff Ramsey: regretting turning on the news

Jack Pattillo: sleeping

Ryan Haywood: tired

 

Michael sighs and slumps down on his bench, shooting a glare at the curious face peering at him from the other cell.

“What the fuck you lookin' at?” He snarls. The guy shrinks and Michael pointedly cracks his knuckles. The guard looks over and raises a bored eyebrow.

Geoff takes one look at the headline crawling across the bottom of the screen and groans for a long minute into his hand.

_Mogar finally captured by LSPD_

Down the hallway Gavin tiredly flicks through TV channels on his tablet and skips over the news – nothing interests him and he puts the tablet down and turns back over to bury his face in the pillow again. He hasn't left the bed for two days but it's not like there's anything to do anyway. What's the bloody point?

Geoff groans out loud when he opens his phone and the first message that pops up is a threat to the Vagabond.

 _He doesn't work here anymore_ , Geoff wants to say, but instead he texts Jack.

Ryan sees the news. He glances down at his splinted fingers – broken a few days ago in a fight he doesn't really remember – and shrugs to himself.

The LSPD HQ's a pretty good blaze of glory to go out in.

 

The guards talk outside Michael's cell while they think he's asleep.

_What's gonna happen to 'im?_

_Him? This kinda case, they'll hurry it through. Barely need a trial._

_Yeah, but – what'll **happen** to 'im? _

_I'll tell you this, son, he won't be doing any time in jail._

Michael's well aware of the lethal injection coming his way, and he never expected to live to retire, but. Couldn't they at least make it _interesting_? He _is_ one of Los Santos' most wanted.

 

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead but not forgotten

Michael Jones: seething

Gavin Free: following orders

Geoff Ramsey: giving orders

Jack Pattillo: finding a chopper

Ryan Haywood: strangely gleeful

Michael's transferred to a max security prison and even gets his own guards – four of them to follow him around. He still starts fights in the rec yard with the other prisoners. He gets dragged away every time but once he manages to land a guy in hospital.

Geoff's trying to organise a rescue – it's hard with only him, Jack, and Gavin, but he'll try his fucking best. Right now he's working with Gavin to find good entry points to the prison.

Gavin won't admit it but he likes having something to focus on, something to _do_.

Ryan's going back to guns and rockets and boy oh boy, will he have fun with this.

Michael's date is set for a month. It's the quickest trial he's ever seen.

“I ain't got no family,” he spits when they ask who they should call. The Jersey comes out thick when he's annoyed, and besides, he hasn't had a family in months now. Left them behind, didn't he, like he _always fucking does_?

Michael's banned from the TV room during rec time but he can overhear snippets of the news – he _is_ the news, mostly. It doesn't help much, hearing his testimony repeated over and over again.

_I, Michael Jones, do plead guilty to the charge because I am, in fact, a huge fucking criminal._

He wonders how Gavin's doing. Maybe he's better without Michael.

Gavin wonders how Michael's doing. Maybe he's glad to be rid of Gavin.

Fade to black.

 

Faint music – a beat, forming, forming – crescendo, a dramatic symphony of violins as Michael walks out of his cell.

There's four guards around him, strangely solemn as they walk him to his death.

Michael sneers at the people in the viewing gallery as he's led to the cot, strapped down like a dog as the priest calmly averts his eyes.

The nurse tells him it won't hurt.

Michael wants it to, though.

The music plays softly, somberly, in the background.

They tell him to relax as they stick a needle in him.

 

He thinks, briefly, of Gavin.

He thinks, briefly, he had a good thing there.


	5. Chapter 5

BOOM CRASH

The building shakes with an explosion and everyone screams as wind rushes through the hole in the wall.

 

Record scratch, freeze frame, what the _fuck_?!

Ray Narvaez Jr.: dead, dead, still dead, still fucking _dead_

Michael Jones: strapped down and suddenly wide awake

Gavin Free: gaping

Geoff Ramsey: losing his _goddamn_ mind

Jack Pattillo: surprised but not disappointed – for once

Ryan Haywood: covered in rubble and dust and blood spray and _grinning_

 

Rewind, slo-mo

The wall to Michael's left buckles and bows in. A deafening, _familiar_ explosion booms through the room.

The nurse screams.

Concrete breaks and crashes loudly to the floor, kicking up a cloud of dust that obscures the villain but Michael would recognise that cocky jaunt anywhere.

Ryan, standing in the wall-less space, a rocket launcher in one hand and an unpinned grenade in the other.

Well, at least this is an interesting way to die.

 

Okay, back to normal-mo.

Ryan winks at Michael and tosses the grenade at Michael's guards, abruptly cutting off their shooting with a thick layer of smoke that chokes Michael – while he coughs and his eyes water, Ryan cuts through his bindings.

The police are scrambling to cover – they weren't expecting the Vagabond.

No one was.

Last anyone heard from him was in Vice City – LSPD didn't chase, just thankful he was gone.

Well bitches, now he's back.

He's a little more jagged these days.

It fits perfectly with Michael's sudden will to be alive.

 

Geoff and Gavin are having a meltdown over the comms as Jack flies in. There's screaming and confusion and a prison guard clips the chopper blades, sending it spinning and Jack struggles to straighten it out as Geoff yells conflicting orders.

Gavin cuts into the cameras, watches with no small amount of relief as Ryan hauls Michael up to standing, pushes a pistol into his hand and starts to lead him away.

Michael's _alive_. Any hurt Gavin felt over his leaving is temporarily replaced with adrenaline, a drive to keep him alive.

Jack responds to new orders from Gavin and Geoff falls silent, working on a getaway vehicle to help Ryan out because look, Ryan left but he's still Geoff's fucking _friend_.

Smoke bombs burst in quick succession and Michael clumsily runs after Ryan, knees shaking with the thrill of the jailbreak.

By the time Geoff's found, broken into, and secured a car, the Vagabond and Michael are long gone.

Jack flies away from the prison, alarms blaring and police sirens whooping as smoke rises from Michael's cell block.

Gavin loses the tracking and instead of being angry, Geoff just sighs and orders them back to base.

Los Santos goes on as usual – night falls fast and dark, neon lights flipping on to illuminate the roads like something out of a cartoon show. What's left of the Fakes is trying to regroup, trying to figure out where their ex-members are.

 

Somewhere in a dim sewer below Vespucci, a flipped car a few metres behind them, two men are pointing pistols at each other. Michael pulled first.

“Let me fucking go,” he says. The skull mask tilts and the gun doesn't waver.

“I didn't break you out to kill you.”

It's a tense standoff and Michael feels it here that the needle didn't kill him but this might.

Dangerous to play with fire, after all.

“Thought you were gone.”

“Looks like I came back.”

Burning bridges all the way.

“Why?”

The mask sighs.

Burning until it burns itself out.

There's a pink sniper rifle on the Vagabond's back. A new scar on the back of his hand.

The gun lowers. Michael keeps his raised.

“I have somewhere to be.”

Michael doesn't shoot as the Vagabond walks away.

Cut to black.

 

Eighteen months – a whole goddamn year and a _half_.

Ray Narvaez Jr.: starting to rot underground

Michael Jones: sleeping

Gavin Free: packing

Geoff Ramsey: passed out

Jack Pattillo: passed out

Ryan Haywood: painfully awake

The clock strikes two and Gavin hikes his backpack up on his shoulder. He's left behind whatever isn't his – guns, tech, the brass knuckles, the new shoes. There's a neatly folded note on the desk, simply addressed to _Geoff and Jack_. There's a lump in his throat.

Gavin sneaks past Geoff on the sofa and Geoff stirs when he opens the front door.

“Gav?”

Gavin offers a small apology and slips out into the night, closing the door behind him. His penthouse key is taped to the back of the note.

Somewhere in Geoff's muddled, half-asleep brain, he knows he's lost another one.

Michael's place is alive with the house party next door and Michael just grumbles into his pillow and slams it over his ears to drown out the loud music.

He hasn't quite worked up the nerve yet to get in touch with his old crew.

Ryan stares up a blank ceiling and seriously considers the loaded gun in his bedside drawer. It would be easy, he thinks. Simple. He knows how to pull a trigger.

The glimpse of the pink gun in the far corner of the room reminds him. Harsh like a punch to the nose.

 _You don't deserve the easy way out, Haywood_.

Sunrise glows over the horizon a few hours later, washes out the sad loneliness of night and replaces it with hollow hope, as if brightness only ever meant good.

 

Ray Narvaez Jr.: you got it, still dead

Michael Jones: left but not gone

Gavin Free: typing

Geoff Ramsey: glum

Jack Pattillo: silent

Ryan Haywood: unconscious

 

The Fakes aren't what they once were. They're broken.

Geoff watches the monitors as files disappear right in front of his eyes, security codes and camera footage wiped clean like it was never there.

Gavin's holed up in a new flat near Vespucci, remotely deleting any trace of himself in the Fakes' system. He doesn't know Geoff's watching; Geoff doesn't text to say he is. It's better this way, Gavin tell himself. Never there.

Michael's place is way east on the map, but he's way south right now, burning his Fake vehicles at the docks and watching his past go up in wild flames. Engine explosions shatter the air and when sirens start whooping he leaves in a nondescript four-door. He'll lay low for a while – the LSPD'll notice soon that the Fakes are no longer in operation.

Michael thinks about his near-death at the hands of the law, deletes phone numbers. Hesitates at Gavin's. Remembers. Deletes.

The Fake AH Crew has finally crumbled – more fake IDs disappear off the computer, more addresses. Geoff sighs and Jack places a comforting hand on his shoulder.

 _It's over_.

When the system is wiped, Gavin moves over to the LSPD database, removes any trace of any of them. Even any of Ray. Out of respect. Or something. Feels wrong to keep his rap sheet there when he's a closed case.

Ryan's resorted to sleeping pills and bad habits. It's the only way he can sleep anymore.

 

Fade to black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, FUCK guys I'm sorry for leaving you on a cliffhanger earlier. I had to think how this fic was going to end because that affected what I wrote in this chapter. 
> 
> Thanks so much to everyone who's shown any hint of positivity towards this - whether it be through kudos or comments - and I'm sorry about the late update, but hopefully you like where I'm going with this.


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